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GOP, online commenters hit back at Obama’s claim that US businesses are ‘doing fine’

The furor over President Obama’s remark that businesses in the United States are “doing fine” raged on yesterday as politicos and pundit wannabes debated the finer points of the gaffe over the Internet.

Obama was forced to walk back his statement late Friday by saying it’s “absolutely clear that the economy is not doing fine” as 12.7 million Americans remain unemployed.

The president’s gaffe played to Republican claims that Obama doesn’t get the serious state of the economy.

* “Obama’s ‘the private sector is doing fine’ comment shows how completely out of touch with reality he is,” said former House speaker Newt Gingirich on Twitter.

* Sen. Jim DeMint (D-SC) homed in on Obama’s assertion that public-sector growth is what’s really lagging, making it crucial that Congress push through proposals to hire more teachers and first-responders.

“Seems he thinks the private sector has too much money, and government doesn’t have enough,” DeMint tweeted.

* “Mr Obama, I’m truly blessed by my God, but I am not the #PrivateSector nor are the highest % of Americans . . . Glad all is well with U & Yours,” wrote Mathew Turner, ”@matlowercase.

* “Let’s see, Obama’s toss-off remark about #privatesector is so much worse than #Romney’s not caring about poor >how< ?” tweeted @Kate_Chase.

* “I’m sorry to disagree @BarackObama but the #privatesector isn’t “fine” but we do need to strengthen local and state govt #obama2012,” tweeted @RevBigBabyHuey.

* “What about those of us who are not teachers, first responders, I guess we don’t matter ?” wrote H. Holcomb, ”@hsh316.